Nightmares from the Deep: The Cursed Heart

Nightmares from the Deep: The Cursed Heart is rated T for Teen by the ESRB with Alcohol Reference, Blood and Gore, Mild Violence, and Use of Tobacco. This is a hidden-object adventure game in which players control a mother who must rescue her daughter from a centuries-old pirate. Players solve puzzles and collect inventory items to advance the narrative. In addition to some dark thematic elements (e.g., slumped-over skeletons; references to death and murder in the dialogue), the game depicts brief acts of violence: a woman jumping from a ship to attempt suicide; sailors getting attacked by pirates (blood splatter appears on screen). Some scenes contain additional blood effects (e.g., bloodstained walls in a wedding hall; blood droplets on a “pact with the devil”); one sequence requires players to collect a beating heart and severed ear to progress. During the course of the game, players use a barrel of rum as an ingredient to create grog. One cutscene depicts a man smoking from a pipe.